Personally, I feel that things SHOULD be falling apart quickly for the bad guys, because they are still World Nobles: arrogant, stupid sociopaths. Even when Jarul was declaring war, Sommers didn't even care a jot.
They tried a cheap way to force Elbaf to surrender and now that it failed, their lackadaisical strategy was to blame for it. Because they thought it would be easy and didn't have to actually do much.